


A True Love of Mine

by myownspark



Category: One Direction (Band), Shawn Mendes (Musician)
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1960s, Alternate Universe - America, Friends to Lovers, Long-Term Relationship(s), M/M, Wakes & Funerals, beach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-23 13:01:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18152198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myownspark/pseuds/myownspark
Summary: Niall's peaceful afternoon at the beach with Shawn is interrupted by a group of strangers. One man in particular reminds him of someone special from long ago.





	A True Love of Mine

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to my betas, who always make my work better in surprising and wonderful ways. I'll thank them by name on reveal day.
> 
> The title is from the song "Scarborough Fair," made popular in the late 1960's by Simon and Garfunkel.

May, 2019

Niall’s feet disappeared further under the sand every time a small wave came in. His beach chair sank a bit too, and soon he was comfortably buried up to his ankles, squinting in the mid-afternoon sun at the crossword puzzle on his lap. 

Forty-seven down: Marvel movies’ Odin. Seven letters, last letter S.

Shawn would know. He always knew the answers to the movie clues, because he’d stay up long after Niall, watching the HALO or HULA or whatever it was called, just to keep up with those Avengers and Hogwarts and whatnot. Niall couldn’t blame him. Some of those young men were quite the lookers. Like Captain America, jumping out of a helicopter with no shirt on. Or was that Tom Cruise?

“Hon, help.”

Shawn was a few yards away, bent at the waist, obliviously picking through a pastel pile of shells. A frustrated thought about Shawn losing his hearing crossed Niall’s mind, not for the first time today. He sighed, but then softened, figuring his voice got lost in the quiet but constant sounds of waves and wind. 

He let his eyes follow the line of Shawn’s legs. They were no longer thick with muscle as they’d been when he was younger, when he and Niall golfed and swam and ran along the beach in the mornings together. But still, Niall wanted to touch them, feel the warm strength there, even though the tan skin looked thin and crepey with wrinkles. Quite a pair they made, Niall thought, as his fingers skimmed over his own belly that rolled over the waistband of his swim trunks. 

He picked up his water bottle and took a swig. “Hon!” He called louder, “You’re going to hurt your back, all hunched over like that!” 

Shawn slowly pushed up to standing with a hand on his thigh. He walked toward Niall with a slight stoop in his shoulders, and offered a near perfect clam shell, cream-colored and as big as his palm. 

“That’s a good one,” Niall said. They’d found hundreds over the years, but still, they’d find a place for it in the garden or on the porch steps. Or maybe they’d leave it here to be swept back out and found again. 

“Were you calling me?”

“I need help with this.” Niall tapped the folded newspaper with his pencil. “But first things first. You need sunscreen. On your legs, especially.” Niall chuckled, reaching out to stroke behind Shawn’s knee. 

Shawn made a show of being tickled and batted Niall’s hand away, but his smile was playful. “Now, don’t get fresh. You’re just looking for an excuse to … Uh oh.”

“Hmm?”

“Look.”

Niall turned, pulling off his readers. They’d been alone on their neighborhood beach, not unusual for a Tuesday afternoon in late May, but now there was a small group of people making their way onto the sand. It was a family, Niall guessed; he could pick out three generations, the youngest ones just teenagers. Not a one of them was dressed to enjoy the water or the sun. All wore long pants or skirts in dark colors, as if just coming from a church service or a fancy lunch with white tablecloths. The women didn’t kick off their dress shoes, and some linked arms to steady each other as they walked. The group moved toward the water with the men in front, pointing to the black rock jetty.

“Oh. Damn,” Niall said gruffly, seeing the proof of his suspicions: the eldest of the group, a slow-moving but regal woman with large sunglasses and white-blond hair, walked carefully behind the rest with what looked like a silver vase clutched in her arms. 

“What should we do?” Shawn asked. 

There were regulations about this that had to do with health codes, environmental protection, and public property. Another wave came in, this time barely reaching them, then pulled away with a gentle sound. 

“I think we should just … let them.” Niall stood, feeling a sense of duty, or respect, or something. Maybe it was wrong to watch, and he had an impulse that perhaps he and Shawn should look away, or pick up their things and walk back to the house. Let the family have the beach to themselves, to say their goodbyes in private.

“Oh, they’ve seen us,” Shawn said, and they watched as two of the men spoke and nodded in their direction. Soon one broke away and began to walk toward them, one hand in his pants pocket, the other smoothing his tie.

Niall groaned. “Just tell him it’s fine, alright?” He turned away, back to his chair and his paper. “And tell them we’re sorry and all.”

“Right. I’ll be back.” Shawn brushed his hands together and started off to meet the young man halfway.

Niall shaded his eyes and watched as Shawn shook the stranger’s outstretched hand. He had the posture and gait of a city person, late thirties if Niall had to guess, with an apologetic expression that made him look a bit lost. But there was something else about him, something familiar, even at a distance. Niall was suddenly quite confused, and he found himself taking a few steps backward, heart fluttering in his chest.

It couldn’t be, he thought. But the resemblance was striking. The same slim build, narrow shoulders and long legs. The distinct hairline, where thick, dark waves rose up from the widow’s peak. And those eyes. Those big brown eyes, with their thick lashes. There was only one person on earth who had them.

Niall shuffled to his chair and sat, gripping tightly onto the armrests to steady himself. He studied the sand as Shawn and the man talked. Niall couldn’t hear them, and was glad, for he couldn’t bear it to be the same voice that whispered through his memories. It was a voice that always sounded low and soft, even in anger, and had a feathery tone around its edges. 

Niall didn’t look at Shawn when he returned. Instead, he used his pencil to poke at the sand next to his chair.

“That’s the son,” Shawn said. “They’ve never been here before. But his father put it in his will, this is where he wanted to be. Strange. All the way from Michigan.”

Niall wrestled with wanting Shawn to stop talking and needing to hear every word, every detail this visitor brought to his beach. He dropped the pencil and skimmed his fingers over the pebbles and shells. There were whole ones and broken pieces, smooth or ridged in white, gray, ivory and pink. Some were sharp enough to cut while others were rounded, made soft by the constant wash of the tide. They were all that was left of so many creatures, now just empty husks discarded by the sea. It was terribly sad suddenly, cruel even, for there to be so many fragile, dead things in the sand. 

Niall’s voice was brittle when he spoke a useless thought. “Tide’s going out.”

Shawn sighed. “I gave them our condolences, and said they could stay as long as they want.” 

Niall felt Shawn moving around him, gathering their bag and towels. The shells melted into one another, blurring into a mosaic of tan and white. He swiped at his cheek, remembering a song he hadn’t thought of in years. 

“Let’s just … stay,” Niall said, and Shawn put a hand on his shoulder.

 

April, 1968

Every time a wave came in, Zayn would dig a small hole in the sand just as Niall had showed him. If he timed it just right, when the wave began to pull away he’d see a dozen tiny clams burrowing, hiding from the sun. Coquinas, Niall called them. The smallest ones had multicolored shells, and their feet were like tiny tongues tickling his fingers when he picked them up in handfuls. 

It seemed like the whole beach was alive. Tiny silver fish darted around Zayn’s feet when he waded in, squawking seagulls gathered on the shore, and pelicans flew low over the water, just skimming the surface with the tips of their wings. Even the sunlight was alive on his skin, and sometimes he’d turn to face the sky with his eyes closed to soak it in. Zayn had never felt anything like it, and he was almost embarrassed, every afternoon after their work was done, to tell Niall he’d rather walk the few blocks to the beach than take Niall’s Chevelle to the movies or to the Crow’s Nest for crab cakes and beer. If Niall was bored with this afternoon routine, he didn’t say; he seemed fine to swim or read or stretch out on the blanket, humming those sleepy folk songs he liked. 

Just about everyone else in the dorm had somewhere to go for spring break, but Zayn’s trip home to Detroit for the winter holidays had been all his family could afford, so he’d planned to stay on campus. Niall wouldn’t hear of it. He was going to visit his grandparents to help build their new porch, and it would be no trouble at all for Zayn to come along. It would go much faster with two people working instead of one, he’d reasoned, and of course they’d stay for free, only three blocks from the beach. It would actually be a favor, he’d said, if Zayn could come with. 

They’d driven from school to Niall’s grandparents’ house in Florida four days ago. The trip was a long eight hours, filled with heated discussions about the Tigers and the Braves, arguments over radio stations (Zayn preferred rock, so they decided that whoever was driving got dibs) and stretches of easy silence while Zayn gazed out at a landscape of pine forest that gave way to palm trees. Those silences had given him plenty of time to think.

The truth was, Zayn was finding Niall harder and harder to resist. At first he thought he’d been imagining the touches that bordered on flirtatious, the hip bumps in front of the mirror as they shaved in the men’s bathroom, or a tug on his shirtsleeve while they talked in the dining hall. But then there had been a lingering glance over Zayn’s naked chest when they played shirts and skins basketball at open gym. There had been compliments about his hair, his clothes, and even one about his eyes that Zayn waved off, embarrassed. But secretly he liked them, and replayed them in his mind when he was alone, probably more than he should.  

All of which was nothing compared to what had happened this morning, between awake and asleep.

Zayn held on to the thought for one last moment, then stood up and brushed the sand off his legs, glancing up the beach. Niall was half-napping with his hands folded on his stomach and a baseball cap pulled down over his eyes. Zayn wondered again, with his heart tripping, just what they were to each other. 

When he got close he could hear Niall singing softly. Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme.

“Look,” Zayn said, giving Niall’s foot a gentle kick. He pointed out at the ocean. “Is that the sandbar?”

Niall sat up and rubbed one eye. “Hell yes! Good! Finally! Come on!” He gave his cap a toss and went jogging toward the shoreline.

The long strip of sand was visible under the water, thirty or so yards away. They’d been waiting since their first day for the tide to hit just right, so they could swim out to it safely. Niall said it was shallow out there, the water so clear you could see crabs and starfish.

They swam together toward the pale stripe. “It’s going to get deep now,” Niall said, “but don’t worry. It’s not too far.” The water was cooler out here, away from the shore.  Zayn treaded water and dipped his foot down, and sure enough, it didn’t meet sand. Niall was a stronger swimmer, and he began to pull ahead; Zayn paddled past a small forest of seaweed and prayed his legs would hold out. 

“Here it is!” Niall turned back with a smile. “Feel it?” Zayn watched as Niall stopped swimming and began to walk. His shoulders rose out of the water, then his back, and soon he was standing waist deep.

The sand rose up like a hill under Zayn’s feet, and soon they both stood together on the little island, water just up to their shins. Zayn could clearly see his toes wiggling, and he laughed at Niall, who was doing a shuffling dance.

“It’s how you find the sand dollars,” Niall said. He bent down and brought up a flat brown thing the size and shape of a chocolate chip cookie.

Zayn moved closer to see it, and Niall put it in his hand. The sun glinted off their skin, and water dripped from their hair. The sand dollar’s tiny hairlike spines felt velvety and strange. 

“Cool, huh?” Niall said, still a bit out of breath from the swim. 

Zayn nodded, his chest tingling, impossible now to dismiss the memory. 

He had woken up before dawn to the sound of sheets rustling, and soon they were face to face, looking, touching, panting. Each muscle had tensed, thighs and arms pressed together. Zayn fixed his eyes on Niall’s mouth, teeth biting his lip to stay quiet, until it was over with a shiver and a sigh. Niall’s voice was pretty; Zayn hummed too, happy, and their voices blended together for one delicious moment. Niall stroked his face so tenderly that Zayn had to tuck into the space between Niall’s neck and shoulder, out of sight. They stopped short of kissing, but the way Zayn’s cheek nuzzled against Niall’s hand was almost sweeter, better, more.

They’d fallen back to sleep like that, and later ate the eggs and salted melon Niall’s grandma made for them just as they had every morning, though this time their knees were pushed against each other under the table and there had been furtive, blushing smiles when Niall’s grandpa’s back was turned.

Zayn placed the creature back in Niall’s hand, then looked up. “What’s out there?” he asked, pointing to the dark, choppy water beyond the sandbar. 

“Out there? That’s where the sharks live.” Niall chuckled when Zayn’s eyes got wide, and his soft voice teased, “What, are you scared?”

No, he wasn’t. Zayn felt the opposite, actually, on this island of their own. They were far away from everything, school, the dorm, the term paper he was bullshitting his way through. And close. Close to Niall, and close to all of this warm, salty, buoyant life. So close that for the first time he knew he wasn’t just a part of it, but he  _ was _ it. He turned his head toward the sun, belonging to it, safe.

“No. I’m not scared. I want to stay here.”

He could hear relief in Niall’s voice, and a smile. “You do?”

“Yeah. I do.” 


End file.
